


Movie Night in Paris

by AVegetarianCannibal



Series: Slice of Life [16]
Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Food Kink, M/M, Movie Night, Paris - Freeform, Well almost, Will can make Hannibal love anything
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-02
Updated: 2020-05-02
Packaged: 2021-03-02 04:20:14
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,678
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23959084
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AVegetarianCannibal/pseuds/AVegetarianCannibal
Summary: It’s time for a cuddle on the sofa and chowing down on junk food. Can Hannibal handle Will’s taste in bad movies and even worse snacks?
Relationships: Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter
Series: Slice of Life [16]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/994764
Comments: 29
Kudos: 129





	Movie Night in Paris

**Author's Note:**

  * For [shukkhy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shukkhy/gifts).



> Takes place sometime during their stay in Paris.

As soon as Hannibal hears Cephi’s barking coming from downstairs, he spills a handful of red popping corn into the heavy steel saucepan while deftly flicking it back and forth over the flame. The kernels scatter like smooth garnets across a jeweler’s table. 

The dry, grassy aroma of the hulls toasting reaches his nose, and he places a heavy lid over the pan. An instant later, he’s rewarded with the satisfyingly percussive beat of the kernels popping.

He keeps the pan moving until the popping slows, then cuts the flame. He lifts the lid, releasing a small cloud of fragrant steam. When he gives the pan another shake, he’s satisfied not to hear any unpopped kernels skidding about. 

The entryway door opens, followed by the happy tapping of Cephi’s nails across the hardwood floor. 

“We’re back!” Will calls out.

“Did you find the snacks you were looking for?” Hannibal calls back. He pours melted butter and a hearty pinch of truffle salt over the popped corn. “Did the market have American tortilla chips and salsa authentic enough for you?”

“I found Doritos, which is even better,” Will says, appearing in the kitchen doorway. His eyes are bright and his cheeks are red from the wintry Parisian wind that has been lashing at them. He glances at the stove as he unwinds the long scarf from around his neck. “Smells... fancy.”

“Heritage red corn, popped dry and luxuriously seasoned,” Hannibal says. He pours the glistening little puffs into a large enamelware bowl. “You like truffles.”

Will wrinkles his nose. “Sure, but, you’re not supposed to have _luxurious_ food while watching B-movies on the sofa. You’re supposed to have _junk_ food.”

“I used black truffle salt instead of white,” Hannibal says, holding up the small jar of minuscule gray crystals. 

Will laughs and his brows vault towards his hairline. “The difference between fancy and junk is not white truffles or black truffles. Prison food must have been miserable for you.”

Hannibal huffs. “With a powerful enough imagination, the dullest dish of overcooked oats and stale raisins becomes a silky porridge enriched with thick cream and studded with burstingly sweet berries. Additionally, Alana Bloom allowed me certain culinary privileges.”

Will regards him with crossed arms and narrowed eyes. “Did you _ever_ have to eat plain oatmeal while you were in there?”

“Once or twice,” Hannibal says, tossing some popcorn into his mouth. He gives an innocent shrug. “I suppose I was merely lucky Dr. Bloom was in such a generous mood.”

“You asshole,” Will says without much venom. He holds out his hand. “Come on. Before Cephi hogs the entire sofa for herself.”

Hannibal grabs his bowl before letting Will pull him into the living room, where their darling dog has situated herself in the window seat. The muscles in her hind legs are tense with anticipation and the hair on her shoulders is bristling.

“Your second father accused you of being greedy,” Hannibal tells her. “I, on the other hand, knew you’d be a perfect angel.”

She wags her tail without looking over at either of them. Her attention, sharp as a laser beam, remains focused on something on the street below.

“I wouldn’t let her eat any of the pigeons the doorman was feeding,” Will explains. “She’s probably checking to see if they’re still down there in need of murdering. Sit.”

It takes Hannibal a second to realize Will is speaking to him and not to the dog, yet he drops down onto the sofa just the same.

“You are in for a treat tonight,” Will says. He goes about setting up his laptop on the coffee table and adding extra speakers for theatrical effect. “I’ve downloaded the entire _Volcano Zombie_ trilogy in high-def quality. We’ll be able to see every drop of glue holding the latex prosthetics onto each extra’s face.”

Hannibal, pausing with a handful of popcorn near his mouth, is overwhelmed with questions—and a chilling sort of dread. What on earth do volcanoes have to do with the living dead? Why and how does his beloved seem to be an aficionado of such films? Has this knowledge been lurking inside him all this time, unbeknownst to Hannibal? Is _this_ what lives in the bone arena of his skull now? 

Hannibal forces himself to focus.

“ _Volcano_ ... _Zombies…_ trilogy? There are _three_ of them?”

“There’s the original, of course,” Will says, testing a speaker, “but _Volcano Zombies 2: The Re-Erupting_ is exponentially better, in my opinion, while _Volcano Zombies 3: Volcano Versus Aliens_ is the weakest, but necessary for the character resolution.”

“They sound awful,” Hannibal says before he can stop himself.

“Oh, they are _very_ awful,” Will says, to Hannibal’s mingled relief and confusion. “I’d be hard pressed to find worse movies in the same budgetary tier.”

“Then why are we watching them?” Hannibal asks. “Are you punishing me? Are you punishing yourself?”

“Don’t think about it,” Will says. “Just enjoy. Give yourself over to the experience.”

Hannibal is still dreadfully confused as Will kicks off his shoes and pulls the blanket off the back of the sofa. Will settles in beside him, using Hannibal’s thigh as a sort of armrest. His back, broad and muscular, leans into Hannibal’s side with a familiar and comforting weight. Hannibal shifts slightly so that he can cozy Will into the crook of his shoulder. The top of Will’s head is within kissing distance, and so Hannibal indulges. His hair smells of the promise of snow and the orange flower in his shampoo. Hannibal moans softly.

“Don’t make me too horny before _Volano Versus Aliens_ ,” Will warns as he reaches over to start the first movie. If you wanna make out later, the first half of that one is a good time for it. Turn off the light?”

Hannibal fumbles over his shoulder for the lamp. His fingers connect with the switch and darkness falls over the room, broken only by the faint light of the early-setting sun and the pulsating glow coming from the laptop screen. Cephi, her attention still on the street, drops into something halfway between repose and a watchful crouch.

Hannibal does his best to heed Will’s advice and refrain from overthinking the movie, but details nag at him. Why did the Soviets hide nuclear waste in a volcano in Canada? How could anyone think that was feasible? How did the Canadians not notice, save for one alcoholic Mountie that nobody believed until it was too late? How would a combination of magma and uranium “enriched with prehistoric nematode DNA” cause corpses to return to life? Why did the head Russian scientist have such a thick Swedish accent and why was he so frequently nude? Taking off one’s clothes to collect lava samples seemed foolhardy at best.

“I don’t understand any of this,” Hannibal whispers.

“Just wait till the third movie when the main volcano gains sentience,” Will whispers back. “That’s when the nematode DNA gets explained and it makes no fucking sense whatever.”

“The volcano gains sentience!” Hannibal all but shouts it, no longer able to contain himself. Cephi _whuffs_ from the window at the sudden outburst. “Sentience!”

Will shushes him. “Just keep watching! Don’t pause it—I’m gonna go get my Doritos.”

He shuffles off to retrieve his shopping bag from the entryway. A crinkle of mylar and a cloud of bitter, herbaceous fumes announce his return.

Hannibal’s breath catches in his throat as if his lungs refuse to inhale another malodorous assault.

A Dorito crunches in Will’s mouth. “Fuck, that’s so good,” he says with a moan and breath that smells of livestock-grade corn. He licks his fingers as he resumes his spot on the sofa. “I haven’t had Cool Ranch Doritos in _years_ —or Cool American, as they’re called here, apparently. Worldwide, Americans are just synonymous with ranch dressing.”

“Will, I can stomach these movies if I must,” Hannibal says, “but your ‘Doritos’ smell like vomited salad.”

“That’s the buttermilk in the ranch,” Will says, crunching into another mouthful. “Well, and the powdered cheese, I guess.”

“Powdered cheese!” It was as inexplicable as prehistoric nematode DNA being somehow activated by uranium and magma. “Oh, _Will_.”

Will shushed him again and gestured at the screen. “This one’s almost over. The head scientist’s love interest is contaminated with the DNA and she’s going to try to throw herself in the lava stream to keep from becoming a zombie.”

Hannibal sighs, exasperated. “If the lava _caused_ the zombie manifestation in the first place, why would she think it would _stop_ it?”

Will just grumbles and jams more food—to use the word lightly—into his mouth.

By the end of the first sequel, Hannibal has to excuse himself to use the restroom. He gives himself a long look in the mirror and splashes his face with cold water. He even blows his nose several times into a tissue to try to purge his beleaguered scent receptors, but they may have been permanently injured by the chemicals in Will’s idea of movietime snacks. Hannibal knows he recovered from gunshot wounds and a precipitous plunge into the rocky Atlantic, but will he heal from this? _Can_ he heal from this?

“Don’t be so dramatic,” he whispers to himself. “Just go back in there and seduce him until he stops eating those dreadful things.”

But when he walks back in, he finds Will sprawled out on the sofa, his shirt and sweater having mysteriously disappeared, and now wearing only two bright yellow triangles over his nipples. It’s like emerging into a forest clearing to find a naked satyr festooned with a crown of junk food.

Hannibal almost trips over his own feet.

“Damn you to hell,” Hannibal whispers as he drops down onto his knees beside Will without a conscious thought. He’s always going to be drawn inexorably to Will, even if mass-produced vomit chips stand between them.

Will reaches out to run his fingers through Hannibal’s hair. “Obviously my goal of teaching you to love terrible movies failed, but maybe I can get you to love something else.”

“I waited in prison for you—with plain oatmeal,” Hannibal says even as he leans into Will’s touch. “Isn’t that testament to my love for you?”

Will sits up and the Doritos tumble off his chest like a pair of duck’s feet kicking through water. He takes Hannibal’s face in his hands. “This isn’t about loving me. This is about loving junk food.”

He then proceeds to kiss Hannibal lightly on the mouth, his lips gritty with Dorito flavoring. His hot breath reeks of garlic powder and desiccated onions, and always, _always_ that pungent cheese.

“As you well know,” Hannibal says, “I have been in the presence of bodies in varying levels of decomposition, both as a doctor and as a chef, but this odor is something else entirely.”

Will rolls his eyes. “You cannot possibly think Doritos smell worse than dead people.”

“The Doritos are _unnatural_ ,” Hannibal says, as insistent as he’s ever been.

“Oh, it’s just some spices and dairy extracts.” Will picks up the bright blue bag and scans the nutrition label with a deepening frown. “All right, it’s a _little_ unnatural. Just get over it and lick your lips, would you?”

Hannibal closes his eyes and summons his powers of imagination. With a breath to steady himself, he runs just the tip of his tongue along the inner edge of his upper lip.

The desiccated onion bitterness gives way to the sweetness of Cipollini onions fresh from an Italian garden. The cheese powder’s similarity to bile is slowly replaced by the delicate piquancy of a perfect Azeitão he had once in Portugal. The garlic once swayed in a beautiful braid over a Sicilian kitchen window…

“Are you using your imagination to change the ingredients?” Will asks, his tone accusatory.

Hannibal opens one eye. “Perhaps.”

Will sighs. “The beauty of these chips is how there’s absolutely nothing refined about them, yet they somehow come together into this… this… decadent, slightly taboo indulgence.”

Hannibal licks his lips again. “I apologize, but I keep tasting the fact that the cheese came in a large cardboard drum that probably had to be opened with a pry bar. At least allow me to pretend the corn came from a small Peruvian farm—”

Will cuts him off. “If you’re going to use your imagination, then imagine me as a twenty-year-old college student.”

Before Hannibal’s eyes, Will’s hair thickens and the scars vanish from his face. His jaw is smooth and hairless, not yet roughened by frequent shaving. His body grows more slight, though his shoulders remain broad. His lips are nearly as red as hulls of the popcorn Hannibal prepared earlier.

“You must have had to fend off suitors everywhere you went,” Hannibal says. 

Will snorts. “I’d already cultivated quite the reputation for being a total weirdo. Very few people who met me were actually attracted to me.”

“Impossible,” Hannibal scoffs. “But do go on. What shall I imagine next?”

“I was several levels beneath dirt poor,” Will says. As Hannibal watches, Will’s trousers develop threadbare patches at the knees. “I didn’t live in the dorms. I sometimes ate food that had been left behind in the cafeteria. Mostly, I cooked pinto beans and rice and picked wild garlic from the overgrown ditch behind the mechanic shop where I worked.”

“That sounds fairly delectable,” Hannibal says.

“I had to clench my ass cheeks through class to keep from farting,” Will says. “My underwear was so old, I would’ve blasted holes through them.”

“I would’ve taken care of you if I’d known you then,” Hannibal says. “Gaseous omissions and all.”

“This isn’t about you being my sugar daddy,” Will says. “Focus, okay? The only indulgence I allowed myself was a bag of Cool Ranch Doritos once a week after I’d saved up all my spare nickels and pennies.”

Hannibal watches a painfully beautiful and withdrawn young Will as he hands over handfuls of change to buy his single bag of chips. He watches as Will sits on the park bench that’s halfway between the convenience store and the room he rents above the mechanic shop. This was the treat he’d waited all week for—a food considered rather lowbrow by those with far more money and taste. But young Will savored every granule of flavor, every shattering crunch of corn. It was something other students took for granted, ate without a single thought, but for Will it was… _transcendent_.

As Hannibal turns his attention to the present, young Will becomes _his_ Will. Impossibly, he’s even more stunningly beautiful for the lines at the corners of his eyes and the grays just beginning to salt his beard.

Hannibal pushes himself up off his knees and tackles Will onto the sofa. Will exhales a little “oof!” of surprise, which Hannibal swallows as he presses their mouths together.

He also swallows the monosodium glutamate and cheese powder and burnt-paper blandness of the corn that comprises the foundation of the Doritos. The garlic breath is no less pungent, but now it carries with it the pleasure of indulgence. Hannibal does not recoil when Will laughs breathily in his face.

He cradles the back of Will’s head in his palm so he can kiss him more deeply. When Will presents him with a gritty, ranch-flavored thumb, Hannibal kisses that, as well.

Will shifts beneath him so that they both fit on the sofa, more or less. Hannibal has to slot his left leg between Will’s thighs and shove his elbow between the cushions, but the awkward angle gives him access to those dust-laden nipples.

Hannibal licks one and then the other, lapping up the desiccated onion from the scant hairs that populate Will’s areolae. Will laughs and gasps and grinds his hips up toward Hannibal’s ribcage. Hannibal finds one of the chips that slid from Will’s torso and licks it from one corner to the next.

“Oh my God,” Will groans. “I shouldn’t find that so sexy. It’s so ridiculous.”

The savory umami notes that underlie the seasoning are, Hannibal has to admit to himself, sort of… _addictive_. He crumbles the whole chip into his mouth, much to Will’s obvious and somewhat disbelieving delight.

“Give me another,” Hannibal says.

Will reaches for the bag and plucks out a chip. Just before Hannibal can snatch it from his fingers, Will places one corner between his lips and makes a sound of invitation.

Hannibal raises up on his hands and knees, careful to avoid kneeling on Will’s groin, and leans down bite down on one of the other corners.

They break the Dorito between them and each eat their own half.

Will laughs, throwing his head back in such sweetly beautiful joy. “If college me could see me now.”

Hannibal slides into position beside Will, and they adjust themselves to lie on their sides facing one another. Hannibal kisses the crooked bridge of Will’s imperfectly lovey nose and brushes his hair off his brow.

“How much of that college story was true?” Hannibal asks.

“Most of it,” Will says. “I _was_ poor, but I didn’t use Doritos to transcend my impoverished misery. Nor did I pick wild garlic from a ditch.”

“But you did save up money to buy them every week?” Hannibal asks.

“Oh hell yes,” Will says. “I alternated with Nacho Cheese Doritos, though. The shop here didn’t have those.”

Hannibal is as confused by this new revelation as he was by the _Volcano Zombies_ plot. He shrugs. “Then what was the appeal?”

“I just liked them,” Will says. “I still do like them. Love them, in fact! Just like I love shitty horror movies. There’s not always a reason.”

“There’s a reason I love—well, tolerate—them.” Hannibal licks ranch powder off his fingers. Will raises his eyebrows, curious. “Because you love them. If you want to eat chips that smell like juices from the human digestive tract, I will not only abide your choice, but may even indulge in a few myself.”

Will slips his arm around Hannibal’s waist and rubs slow, gentle circles into the small of his back. “Just wait until you see what I have in store for us tomorrow.”

“More iconically American chips?” Hannibal asks.

“Canned spaghetti and _Lady and the Tramp_.” Will’s eyes are bright with mischief. “Imagine my surprise when I found Chef Boyardee on the shelf today!”

Hannibal doesn’t bother trying to control his expressions. His face wants to turn into a mask of horror and so he lets it. “What on earth?”

Will looks angelically innocent, which of course is a lie of the highest order. “Well, you see, _Lady and the Tramp_ is an animated movie—”

Hannibal reaches between them and pinches Will’s nipple. “I know what _Lady and the Tramp_ is! I’m a wealthy Lithuanian count, not an alien from another planet.”

Will suddenly sits up, dislodging Hannibal. “Oh, shit! I forgot about _Volcano Versus Aliens_!”

The movie, which has been playing uninterrupted this whole time, seems to have reached a denouement. A badly computer-generated alien spacecraft is rising up from the Canadian wilderness and toward the setting sun while the trilogy’s surviving characters wave goodbye. The forest floor is littered with the corpses of the dead undead, some of whom appear not to realize the camera is on them as they check their smartphones or scratch at their zombie prosthetics.

“The love interest survived,” Hannibal notes. “Pity she didn’t pitch herself into the lava. I was somewhat interested to see how that turned out.”

“Oh, she did,” Will says. “The aliens resurrected her with their cloning technology. Also, she’s part nematode now.”

Half a dozen questions occur to Hannibal, but he pushes them aside. If he starts once again trying to understand the completely nonsensical plot of a trilogy that even its most ardent fan admits is awful he’ll waste time he could be spending with in _much_ more satisfactory ways.

“Is it too late to make out?” Hannibal asks.

“Never,” Will says, and crawls into Hannibal’s lap.

They kiss. They kiss until their lips are red and tender from one another’s stubble. They kiss until every trace of the ranch seasoning is gone and Hannibal can only taste the sweetness of Will and smell only the soft warmth of his skin and the orange flowers of his shampoo.

Hannibal sighs, happy and frightfully content. He kisses Will’s brow and the softly lined corners of his eyes, then sits back simply to take in the view.

Will gives him a lazy, slightly drunken smile. “What is it?”

“Just enjoying looking at you,” Hannibal says. “And wondering, between the two of us, who is Lady and who is the Tramp.”

“I’m obviously Tramp,” Will says. 

“Tramp is worldly,” Hannibal reminds him. “He woos Lady with his charms.”

Will rolls his eyes. “Tramp would never argue that black truffles made his popcorn _junk food_.”

Hannibal shifts him out of his lap and gives him a light swat on the hip. “Put your shirt back on so we can take Cephi for her pre-bedtime walk.”

Upon hearing her name and the magical “w” word, she hops down from the window seat and trots over to them. She sits dutifully at Hannibal’s feet with her head lifted, waiting for him to attach the lead to her collar.

“You know,” Will says as he pulls his sweater down over his shirt. “If you’d rather, I can download the unofficial sequel to the trilogy where the mountie becomes a psychic vampire hunter and save _Lady and the Tramp_ for another night.”

Hannibal is horrified. Vampires? Were they, too, caused by nuclear waste and volcanoes? What prehistoric creature’s DNA was bastardized to give this man psychic abilities? There wasn’t even the slimmest chance that the plot would make any sense, nor that the acting quality would be anything more than utterly abysmal.

“Is there any reason we can’t watch both?” Hannibal asks.

“Nope,” Will says, giving him a peck on the cheek and an unmistakable smile of triumph. “None at all!”

  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> I, like Will, happen to love Cool Ranch Doritos.


End file.
